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Viaplay Lands in Germany

Viaplay Content Distribution has launched its Viaplay channel as an add-on subscription to Prime Video via Prime Video Channels in Germany. Prime Video Channel subscribers can access Viaplay’s offering of Scandinavian and European series and films starting today, Oct. 22.

Viaplay’s German offering includes high-quality and impactful Nordic series and films, including award-winning Nordic noir dramas such as “End of Summer,” “Face to Face,” “The Bridge,” “Gåsmamman,” “Furia,” “Trom,” “Stockholm Requiem,” “The Sandhamn Murders,” “Unit One,” “The Team,” “Wallander,” and “Darkness: Those Who Kill.” The platform will also host three films from the Millennium/The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo franchise.

Other titles included at launch are the YA series “Threesome” and “Delete Me”; dramas “Seaside Hotel,” “Love Me,” “Pörni Seasons,” “The Beach Hotel” and “Lyckoviken”; and documentaries “The Prize of Silence,” “Operation Cannabis” and “Wozniacki & Lee.”

BBC Back Catalog Deals

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The Swedish thriller series “Hostage” (Kapningen), based on Fredrika Bergman’s novel, will premiere in the US and Canada on November 1st via the PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel. A follow-up to the series “Sthlm Rekviem,” also adapted from Bergman’s work, “Hostage” centers on a remotely hijacked flight from Stockholm to San Francisco. The hijackers’ demands […]

Swedish Thriller ‘Hostage’ to Premiere on PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel...

Walter Presents has inked a two-year deal with Scandinavian streaming service C More to launch a curated selection of international scripted series across Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland.

Walter Presents, which specializes in premium foreign-language programming, will initially launch on C More with an 80-hour collection comprising eight first-run and exclusive series, including the Dutch psychological thriller “The Blood Pact”; Italian crime thrillers “Thou Shalt Not Kill” and “Ice Cold Murders: Rocco Schiavone” (pictured); and the French crime dramas “Vanished by the Lake” and “The Other Mother,” and the gripping Belgian political action thriller “Blackout.” The company’s goal is to expand its offer on C More to 500 hours over the next two years.

A key streaming service in the Nordics, C More has been investing in local drama productions and has a large portfolio of popular reality and TV shows, on top of exclusive broadcasting rights for major sports leagues.

Exclusive: Betty Gabriel (Get Out) has been tapped for a major new series regular role in the upcoming third season of Prime Video’s Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, starring John Krasinski.

Gabriel, who will play Elizabeth Wright, the Chief of Station, replaces Marianne Jean-Baptiste, who was originally tapped for the part last fall. Jean-Baptiste has exited the series over creative differences. Jack Ryan is currently in production on Season 3, and the few scenes Jean-Baptiste had filmed will be reshot with Gabriel.

Also cast as series regulars in Season 3 are James Cosmo (His Dark Materials), Peter Guinness (Cursed), Nina Hoss (Little Sister) and Alexej Manvelov (Before We Die) in the series, a co-production of Amazon Studios, Paramount Television Studios and Skydance Television.

Season 3 of Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan finds Jack Ryan (Krasinski) on the run and in a race against time. Jack is wrongly implicated in a larger conspiracy...

2018 was a landmark year for Stockholm-based producer Piodor Gustafsson, head of Black Spark Film & TV whose Oscar-nominated films “Border,” “The Wife” and TV dramas “Moscow Noir “and “Sthlm Requiem” landed on screens worldwide. The producer also stepped up to his role as talent spotter/nurturer by adding the job of film and TV agent at Scandinavia’s leading Salomonsson Agency.

Over the last 25 years, through his various roles as indie producer, film consultant for the Swedish Film Institute and commissioning editor for pubcaster Svt, Gustafsson has refined his editorial flair. “As decision-maker, you get to see a lot of projects that get made and you do get a feel of what works or not,” he says.

Although widely diverse in genres, most of his productions are literary adaptations, often combining the daring with the mainstream. “Piodor harnesses unique universes and stories with a great narrative power and relatable characters,...